There are writers I return to no matter what I'm working on, writers like the South African J.M. Coetzee. He has an ability to make you feel that he is writing for you alone.

A name is precious; it carries inside it a language, a history, a set of traditions, a particular way of looking at the world. Losing it meant losing my ties to all those things too.

I began reading in French. I didn't read in English until high school.

Thing that was very different for me is that an American child's reading is filled with Americans.

Every book leaves its mark on you. It might leave you hungry for that kind of book or you may be satiated, and you're eager to read something else. It might send you in a completely different direction. I love that about reading.

Historical novels, in particular, allow us to relive the past without the neatness of history, and with all the complexity of the present.

Immigration, a lexicon. You're a 'migrant' when you're very poor; 'immigrant' when you're not so poor; and 'expat' when you're rich.